Racy billboard moves to Avondale

March 13, 2013|By Adam Lukach, @lucheezy | RedEye

A sexually allusive billboard that that was recently removed from River North has found a new home near an Avondale strip mall.

The billboard, which reads "Because the best job is a b--w job" and features porn star Bree Olsen, was posted above the Portillos at Ontario and Clark for less than a week before it was removed in February. As of last Friday, it resides above a Spin Cycle in the strip mall on Milwaukee Avenue just north of Diversey.

ArrangementFinders.com, the advertisers behind the board, decided on the location as an alternative to River North once the billboard's owners, Urban Core Outdoor, elected to take it down.

"It was a tough spot to be in on our end, because it was doing so well in that location, but we understood where [they were] coming from at the same time," said AJ Perkins, the website's marketing director. " [They] had nothing against the billboard. It was just the flak from that location."

A phone call and email to Alderman Rey Colon were not immediately returned.

Several employees at businesses in and around the strip mall declined to comment, mentioning only that they had seen a lot of people stopping to take pictures in the parking lot. Two men on the sidewalk stopped to laugh and take pictures themselves.

One of them, 29-year-old Brandon Howard, said he didn't think the board was a big deal.

"That sign is the best sign I have ever seen in my 30 years on this earth," he said. "That's part of life, you know? We are all sexual beings. With everything going on in Chicago right now, that's the least of our worries."